My mouth fell open as he dug into the bin and yanked out three more pairs of the impractical, sexy as hell ones. Pink, purple, and red. Then he grabbed a pair of adorable boxer-style undies with red hearts all over them. “And these.”
He shoved them all at the woman, who gave me a sly grin before marching over to the register.
“Knox, I’m not buying all those,” I hissed at him.
“Shut it,” he said and whipped out his credit card.
“If you think for one second that I’m allowing you to buy me underwear—”
He cut off my tirade by slinging an arm over my shoulder and covering my mouth with his hand. “Here,” he said, sliding his card across the counter.
I was squirming against him until he leaned down. “If this is what it takes to get out of this fucking store without passing out from a goddamn hard-on, I’m buying you the fucking underwear.”
By my count, this was the second time he’d mentioned his man parts having a reaction to me. I wasn’t a big enough liar to pretend I wasn’t happy that he found himself in the same predicament as me: Turned on by the physical, turned off by everything else.
I stopped squirming when he pulled me in front of him. With my back flush to his front, I could feel the irrefutable evidence of his claim. My body reacted entirely without my brain’s input and went into five-alarm arousal. I worried that I was going to need to be carried out of the store.
“That was incredibly inappropriate,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest as we left the store, his arm still around me.
“You wanted me to buy something. I bought something.”
“Underwear. For me,” I screeched.
“You look tired,” he said smugly.
“Tired? I’m exhausted. We’ve walked fifty miles in a mall. I spent every dime and then some. I’m tired. I’m hungry. Most of all, I’m confused, Knox! You’re so mean all the time, and then you show up today and buy me nice underwear?”
“Maybe you’ll think of me when you wear them,” he said, his gaze scanning ahead of us.
“You’re the worst.”
“You’re welcome. We got one more stop,” he said, taking my hand.
I was tired. Too tired to fight. Too tired to pay attention to what store he dragged me into.
“Mr. Morgan.” A tall, skinny kid with a dark goatee waved at us. “We just finished up,” he said.
We were in a cell phone store. I dug my heels in, but Knox merely pulled me forward to the counter.
“Good timing, Ben.”
“Here she is,” the kid said, sliding a brand-new phone toward me. “It’s all set up and in the case. If you need any help downloading your old contacts from the cloud, we’ll be happy to help you. Your new number is written inside the box.”
Baffled, tired, hungry, a little furious, and a lot confused, I stared down at the phone, then up at Knox.
“Thanks,” Knox said to Ben, then handed me the phone.
The case had sparkly daisies on it. “You got me a phone?”
“Let’s go,” he said. “I’m hungry.”
I let him pull me out of the store, remembering at the door to give Ben a wave and a “thank you.”
We were halfway to the arcade when my brain started connecting the dots. “You walked me all over this damn mall without complaining just to wear me out so I’d be too tired to fight you on the phone, didn’t you?”
“Burgers, sushi, or pizza?” he asked.
“Burgers. Knox?”
He kept on walking.
“Knox!” I poked him in the shoulder to get his attention.
When he looked down at me, he wasn’t smiling and he didn’t look smug. “You needed a phone. I got you one. Don’t make this into a thing.”
“You call me needy. You yell at me for working at your bar and tell me the only part of me worth spending time with is my body. Then you show up on my shopping trip uninvited and buy me underwear and a really expensive phone.”
“That about sums it up, minus the only part of you worth spending time with.”
“Are you always this…this inconsistent? This confusing?”
He stopped walking and looked down at me. “No, Naomi. I’m not always this fucking inconsistent. And I blame you. I don’t want to be into you. I don’t want to spend an entire day wandering around a goddamn mall and fighting traffic for you. I sure as hell don’t want to watch you try on underwear. But I also don’t want you home alone when there’s some guy back in Knockemout looking for you.”
Uh-oh.
“Some guy? Who is it?”
“Dunno. Justice and Wraith are taking care of it. They’ll call Nash in if they need to,” he said grimly.
“What do you mean ‘taking care of it’?” I had visions of bodies and tarps and duct tape.
“Don’t worry about it.”
I started laughing and kept right on going. I couldn’t help it. I’d spent the last four years in a relationship where I took care of everything. Every dinner reservation. Every vacation. Every load of laundry. Every grocery run.
Here I was in town for less than two weeks, and the grumpy guy who mostly hated me had just taken care of me.
Maybe someday I’d find a guy who both liked me and was willing to share the burden of taking care. Or maybe I would just end up alone like Tina had always predicted.
“You having some kind of breakdown? ’Cause I sure as hell have better things to do than watch that.”
“Oh, good,” I said, smothering my hysteria. “Grumpy Knox is back. What does this guy look like?”
“According to Justice, he looks like some dude named Henry Golding.”
“Henry Golding the hot actor or Henry Golding some local biker?” It was a very important distinction.
“I don’t know any Henry Golding biker. But this guy showed up at the cafe asking for you. Justice said he about lost it when he saw your sister’s mug shot behind the register.”
I was never going to live this down.
“You know him?”
It was my turn to be evasive. “Can we get Waylay and go for those burgers?”
THE INFAMOUS STEF
Naomi
On the way home, I programmed Nina’s dads’ numbers into my shiny, new phone. They were not the first numbers in there. Knox had already programmed contacts for Liza, Honky Tonk, Sherry, Waylay’s school, and Café Rev.
There was even one for himself.
I didn’t know what that said or meant. And frankly, I was too damn tired to worry about it. Especially when I had a bigger problem.
That bigger problem was sitting on the front steps of the cottage with a glass of wine.
“Stay in the truck,” Knox growled.
But I was already halfway out. “It’s fine. I know him.”
Waylay, crammed in the backseat with all our purchases, rolled down her window and stuck her head out. “Who’s that?”
“That’s Stef,” I said.
He put down the wine and opened his arms.
I ran into them. Stefan Liao was the world’s perfect man. He was smart, funny, thoughtful, outrageously generous, and so pretty it hurt to look directly at him. The only son of a real estate-developing father and an app-developing mother, he was born with an entrepreneurial spirit and exquisite taste in everything.
And somehow I’d gotten lucky enough to land him as a best friend.
He swept me up in his arms and twirled me around.
“I’m still incredibly pissed at you,” he said with a grin.
“Thank you for loving me even when you’re pissed,” I said, wrapping my arms around his neck and breathing in his expensive cologne.
Just seeing him, hugging him, made me feel more grounded.
“You gonna introduce me to Blondie and the Beast?” Stef asked.
“Not done hugging yet,” I insisted.
“Hurry it up. Beast looks like he wants to shoot me.”
“He’s more of a Viking than a beast.”
Stef tilted my head back with his hands and planted a kiss on my forehead. “It’s all gonna be fine. I promise.”
Tears stung my eyes. I believed him. And the relief I felt from that was enough to release Niagara Falls of tears.
“Where do you want your shit?” Knox growled.
That was enough to dry up Niagara Falls. I spun around and found him standing only a foot away. “Seriously?”
“Got things to do, Daze. Don’t have all night to stand around watching you make out with Henry Golding.”
“Henry Golding? Nice,” Stef said.
“Waylay, come meet my friend,” I called.
High from her shopping, arcade, and burger experience, Waylay forgot to look annoyed.
“Waylay Witt. Knox Morgan. This is Stefan Liao. Stef for short. Way for short. And Leif Erikson when he’s being moody.”
Stef grinned. Knox growled. Waylay admired Stef’s shiny smartwatch.
“The pleasure is all mine. You look like your aunt,” Stef said to Waylay.
“Really?” Waylay looked not too horrified by that statement, and I wondered if my shopping bribery had worked its magic. Score.
Knox, on the other hand, looked like he wanted to dismember Stef.
“What’s your problem?” I mouthed at him.
He glared at me as if I was the one to blame for his sudden mood swing.
“Knox,” Stef said, holding out a hand. “I can’t thank you enough for looking out for my girl here.”
Knox grunted and stared at the offered hand for a beat before shaking it.
The handshake went on longer than necessary.
“Why are their fingers turning white?” Waylay asked me.
“It’s a man thing,” I explained.
She looked skeptical. “Like pooping for forty-five minutes?”
“Yeah, something like that,” I said.